Associate Director, CMI - Dove Deodorants, North America

Job Purpose

Unilever Consumer & Markets Insight (CMI) exists to provide the inspiration, intelligence and provocation that drive transformational growth. This means connecting consumer understanding with market realities and future possibilities to help the business make sharper choices and act with greater confidence.

This role will help accelerate North America Deodorants growth, with Dove as a critical engine of category growth. It will operate ambidextrously across today and tomorrow: combining consumer understanding with commercial and competitive intelligence to drive market share today, while using foresight and innovation to identify and unlock the growth opportunities of tomorrow.

The role will lead CMI for Dove Deodorants in North America, while maintaining a broader category and competitive lens to understand where growth is coming from, how consumer and shopper needs are evolving, and what Dove must do to continue leading and shaping the category.

Key Accountabilities

Business, Category & Competitive Growth

• Build a clear, ongoing view of category performance, market share, competitive activity, pricing, channels and emerging growth drivers, translating these into implications and actions for Dove.
• Develop a strong point of view on where Dove is winning, where it is losing and why, identifying the biggest opportunities to accelerate penetration, premiumization and market share.
• Connect consumer, shopper, category and commercial intelligence to help leadership make faster, sharper business decisions.
• Partner closely with Marketing, Customer Development, Finance and Performance teams to translate intelligence into tangible growth actions and track their impact.

Innovation & Future Growth

• Shape the short- and long-term innovation agenda for Dove Deodorants, balancing a stronger core, near-term growth opportunities and bigger future growth platforms.
• Identify emerging consumer needs, demand spaces, cultural shifts and category disruption that can create new sources of growth for Dove and the broader deodorants category.
• Ensure innovation choices are grounded in consumer desirability as well as incrementality, scalability, competitive advantage and commercial potential.
• Use AI, social intelligence, experimentation and emerging data sources to spot opportunities earlier, accelerate learning and improve innovation decision making.

Consumer, Brand & Market Intelligence

• Build a connected understanding of consumer, culture, category, competition and commerce, turning multiple signals into a clear growth point of view.
• Deepen understanding of Dove consumers while looking beyond Dove to anticipate changing expectations, competitive disruption and opportunities across deodorants and adjacent categories.
• Strengthen consumer and shopper connectivity across the business, building the team’s instinct for what will win with consumers and in the marketplace.
• Bring leading-edge thinking on social culture, content, media, discovery and purchase behaviors to strengthen Dove’s relevance, distinctiveness and competitiveness.

Strategy, Brand Equity & Portfolio

• Lead consumer and market intelligence to shape Dove Deodorants’ short- and long-term strategy in North America.
• Clarify how brand equity, superiority and distinctiveness translate into competitive growth and stronger commercial performance.
• Shape brand architecture and portfolio choices across core and premium tiers, ensuring clear consumer positioning, value differentiation and roles for each part of the portfolio.
• Connect brand-building choices with category growth, penetration, premiumization and market-share outcomes.

Strategic Leadership & Impact

• Act as a strategic partner to North America Deodorants and Dove leadership, bringing an independent CMI point of view to the biggest growth choices.
• Connect performance today with opportunities tomorrow, ensuring future strategies are grounded in current market realities and today’s decisions build toward where the category is heading.
• Influence across Marketing, Customer Development, R&D, CTI, Finance, agencies and the wider Personal Care CMI community to turn intelligence into action.
• Lead and mentor the CMI team, creating clarity, strengthening commercial and consumer judgment, and building a more future-fit capability across consumer insight, market intelligence, performance and foresight.

Required Qualifications

• Bachelor’s degree required; 12+ years of experience in CMI, consumer research, market intelligence or a related discipline, including experience in the US market.
• Proven track record of turning consumer, shopper, category and commercial intelligence into measurable business action and growth.
• Deep expertise across qualitative, quantitative, primary and syndicated research, spanning brand strategy, equity and positioning, innovation, portfolio, market performance, and digital and media engagement.
• Strong commercial orientation, with the ability to interpret market share, competitive performance, pricing, channel and portfolio dynamics.
• High levels of strategic influencing with leadership and senior stakeholders.
• Strong people leader with experience leading direct and indirect teams.
• Effective storyteller and dot connector who can simplify complexity into clear choices and action.

Preferred Qualifications

• Master’s degree or MBA.
• Confidence to advocate for a clear business point of view and adapt quickly as new information emerges.
• Experience shaping both innovation pipelines and in-market performance agendas.
• Continuous learner who embraces fast-paced digital, social, AI and commercial evolution.
• Competitive drive to win in the marketplace, paired with a genuine passion for Dove, consumers and category growth.

Pay: The pay range for this position is $146,200 to $219,400. Unilever takes into consideration a wide range of factors that are utilized in making compensation decisions including, but not limited to, skill sets, experience and training, licensure and certifications, qualifications and education, and other business and organizational needs. 

Bonus: This position is bonus eligible. 

Long-Term Incentive (LTI): This position is LTI eligible. 

Benefits: Unilever employees are eligible to participate in our benefits plan. Should the employee choose to participate, they can choose from a range of benefits to include, but is not limited to, health insurance (including prescription drug, dental, and vision coverage), retirement savings benefits, life insurance and disability benefits, parental leave, sick leave, paid vacation and holidays, as well as access to numerous voluntary benefits. Any coverages for health insurance and retirement benefits will be in accordance with the terms and conditions of the applicable plans and associated governing plan documents. 

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